Back at the shop, the patients and customers of the apothecary were a mix of faces and stories. A seamstress came for a salve to soothe needle-pricked fingers. A weary mother traded fresh eggs for a tonic to help her child sleep through the night. A blacksmith’s apprentice, with kind eyes and hands blistered from the forge, lingered long enough to flirt with Nattie—the beautiful new girl in town—only to be gently but firmly shooed away by Isla.

Each interaction was a lesson in its own right—how to listen, how to haggle, how to speak the right words, and how to read between the lines of what someone said and what they truly needed. Every day, Nattie was slowly realizing how humans were simultaneously so complicated, and yet so simple. They lived and loved and suffered and stayed alive—just like her.

One evening, after closing the shop, Nattie sat at the counter, flipping through one of Isla’s journals which would, someday, become her book. Her aunt was across the room at her work bench, humming as she mixed a fresh batch of fever balm.

“It’s different, isn’t it?” Isla said suddenly, without looking up. “Living among them?”

Nattie hesitated, fingers brushing over the inked words on the page.

“It is,” she admitted. “But I think I’m starting to understand.”

“Oh?”

“The people here survive off of business and trading and coins. Unlike our people, who share everything without question. Back home, if someone needed bread, they’d have it from a neighbor. If a healer was needed, everyone was helped without debt. But here… everything has a price.”

Isla nodded, carefully spooning the balm into a small glass jar.

“But that price is often too high for the ones who need it most.”

“For instance?”

Nattie thought. “When we went to the butcher, he told us that an entire herd of cattle had to be killed off because they’d been struck with disease. So he’d raised all the prices of his healthy meats. I saw a young woman count her coins and turn away. It was like she just… accepted that she wouldn’t eat meat anymore.”

“Prices always fall again,” Isla said reassuringly.

Nattie closed the journal and set her chin in her palm. “It makes me wonder if the elders were sort of right? Not to kill the northern territory humans, of course. But… well, what if expanding our borders, and mixing our ways with humans, would have been the right path after all?”

Isla set the jar aside and turned to face her. “What would that do?”

“Well, we could teach them how to live without money. How to share and lean on one another. Everyone could divide their talents equally, and it could lead toward a shared harmony.”

Isla raised a brow. “What if someone doesn’t have a talent to share?”

“The community would protect them and care for them. Besides, everyone knows how to contribute, even in a small way.” 

Isla shook her head. “It’s a tough sell for humans. They’re very set in their ways, and you can’t assume that your way is better than theirs.”

Nattie disagreed. “Our way is better. People don’t go hungry at home.”

Isla sighed, but she smiled a little at Nattie’s passionate tone.

“Let’s think about this for a minute,” Isla said. “You saw that woman turn away from the butcher’s stall, and your heart ached for her. I understand, and it’s good that you care. But did you also see the baker’s wife slip a roll into a child’s pocket? Or hear about the tailor mending an old man’s coat without charge?”

Nattie blinked. She had not seen or heard those things. She was too busy watching all the suffering around her.

“Humans aren’t without kindness or compassion, Nattie. They simply show it differently, in ways that work within their world. We work within that world, too. We give people necessary cures. And in turn, they bring us their coins and eggs and woolen gloves and the news of our neighbors, don’t they?” 

Nattie smiled. “Yes, I suppose they do. But that’s a little bit like home.”

“Yes, it is. But it’s not always guaranteed like at home.” Isla gave her a knowing look. “Do you suppose that the people of our clan could ever understand a world of work and coins and haggling at the draper’s stall? And do you really think that humans would adopt our ways without question?”

Nattie shrugged. “Probably not.”

“Our ways aren’t necessarily better, just different,” Isla said. “And different things don’t always mix as easily as we hope.” She reached out, brushing a stray lock of hair behind Nattie’s ear, as she was wont to do. “Sometimes, the word community means a warm meal from a neighbor, a merchant shaving off a coin or two, and an apothecary apprentice who sometimes doesn’t charge for medicine.”

Nattie blushed. “I-I’d just forgotten to charge that one time.”

“No you didn’t,” Isla said with a laugh. “Not all debts are measured in silver, dear. Some are repaid in loyalty and love and trust. You’ll see.”

Nattie suddenly thought of Tommin, who was napping peacefully upstairs—something it had taken them days to convince him to do, so that he could rest and heal. She thought of how he’d started out wary and sharp-tongued, but over the past few days had softened just a little. How he still grumbled, but never ran away, and no longer spoke meanly to them.

The word witch hadn’t crossed his lips again. Not even once. Not even if that’s what the pair of them truly were.

Nattie traced a circle on the wooden counter. “There are so many things I still don’t understand. I know it’s only been over a week but… do you think I’ll ever truly belong here?”

“That depends,” Isla replied.

“On what?”

“Well… do you want to?”

I don’t know, Nattie thought. Maybe.